On 30 April representatives of Cambridgeshire County Council, Police Service and Fire and Rescue Service came to Anglia Ruskin University to carry out a major incident simulation with students on the Foundation Degree in Public Services. Julian Constable, Senior Lecturer in Public Service, has been working closely with representatives of the emergency services with responsibility for resilience and emergency management in delivering the module Resilience and Emergency Management.

The culmination of this work was a tabletop exercise, using a scenario-based method, which requires students to respond in real-time to a major incident. The incident was based at the Junction venue in Cambridge and involved a major fire and ceiling collapse. Students were required to apply their learning of Civil Contingencies legislation and emergency service practice to this incident. Cordons were created, buildings evacuated, command and control structures were set up, triage points set up, rest centres organised and, thankfully, the fire was extinguished!

Students had the benefit of working alongside serving senior professionals in this field on a training exercise that is commonplace in their profession. Bob Bacon, Resilience Officer for Cambridgeshire Constabulary, devised and oversaw the exercise and commented that he "...enjoyed the interface... with Anglia Ruskin and hopes that... we can continue with a programme in the future."

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